President Obama gave an influential speech on counter terrorism and national security policy last week, and while much of the media coverage discussed the President remarks on Guantanamo prison and drone strikes, buried in the speech was a line just as critical to civil liberties online.

Half way through the speech, Obama said he wanted to “review[] the authorities of law enforcement, so we can intercept new types of communication, and build in privacy protections to prevent abuse.”

According to the New York Times, President Obama is "on the verge of backing" a proposal by the FBI to introduce legislation dramatically expanding the reach of the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA. CALEA forces telephone companies to provide backdoors to the government so that it can spy on users after obtaining court approval, and was expanded in 2006 to reach Internet technologies like VoIP.

EFF has long called on companies to publish the number and type of government demands they receive for user data. We think it's important enough to be one of the stars we award in our Who Has Your Back? campaign started in 2010. Users make decisions every day about which companies they entrust with their thoughts, photos, contacts, identities and location data. In order to make informed decisions users -- especially those at risk from repressive governments or engaging in political activism -- need to know how often the government is seeking that information from their providers.